The Winter Meetings Are Upon Us

00:00:21
Speaker 1: Hello everyone, and welcome back to the Hemor Territory Podcast. This is episode three zero six. My name is Brad Rowland. I'll coach you on a Sunday evening here in early December, and I'm joined as I always am, by Scott Coleman. Scott, the Winter Meetings are upon us, and in general that means activity. We'll see about the Braves' activity, but activity around the league. Nonetheless, how are you to see me?

00:00:43
Speaker 2: Hello, Brad, I'm doing well and you're right, this is an exciting time on the baseball calendar. We have seen Alex Enthoplos do some work during the Winter Meetings, but maybe this is not his bread and butter time of the offseason. But every year is going to be different, and hopefully in the next couple of days we get a lot of activity, both for the Braves and around the rest of Major League Baseball. I think as fans of the game, we like to see a lot of activity and movement, and it's been a decently fast offseason so far. It's there have been worse first months of the off season in recent years, for sure.

00:01:16
Speaker 1: Yeah, and you are a harsh critic of that. What it doesn't happen, which I think is right. I will also say is I think I've seen you remind people Stephen Has, Sean Has our colleagues on this podcast, like a lot of business has to get done. Still, we're probably like ten percent of the way if that, into the off season so far. So the Braves have been not even that clide. They actually made a big signing. They just happened to be a guy that we already knew, so it was not agree with the same amount of excitement level that it might have been already. But a lot to get to today. Nothing that's a huge lead topic, but certainly some news and notes inklings around the Winter Meetings are happening in Orlando. They began technically today as records on the Sunday evening. They run officially through Wednesday, but that is not exactly a firm time period, like things could happen before and after, so it's not like we have this window that could only do things in But Alex, like you said, has done some stuff. But I know, by the way we should say this. Our colleague Sean Coleman interviewed Robert Murray, a fan sided and Fould Territory just a few days ago, and that was an awesome conversation. Shouts to Sean, shouts to Robert, and a good prep for the winter meetings. Roberts are really honestly awesome insider. There was a lot of people, There was a lot of things, and I think it was notable that he pointed to starting pitching for the Braves. I listened, I recommend I'm gonna listen to that episode for sure. But I think the quote was that reading between the lines of what Alex said at the GM meetings of what I've heard, this is what Robert was saying, started pitching is absolutely a priority for Antopolis, is the way he said It. Not a huge surprise to us, I don't think, but just another kind of re I don't know, rekindling of that reality. Basically, did you have a response to anything that Robert said that was interesting to use that That's the thing that was like jumping out to me, is in his conversation.

00:02:58
Speaker 2: Yeah, great conversation with Robert. I mean, honestly, I mean, Jeff Passon is the news breaking king of baseball, but honestly, man, Robert is right up there with everybody else. So check out that interview and he's broken Braves news in the past as well, so really great to have Robert on the network. And you know, it's interesting Robert said that pitching is a priority. Starting pitching is a priority for Nthopolis and then today on Sunday, Anthopolis met with the media contingency in Orlando at the Winter meetings. And I don't want to say that he poured cold water on that, and again, you should only take so much at face value what a general manager says to media. But yes, Alex poured a little bit of cold water on the starting pitching thing because he said that Grant Holmes has been progressing really well from his elbow surgery and they're hopeful that he's going to be ready to roll in some kind of a role, and it seems like they've gotten good news on Rinaldo Lopez as well. I still think this team needs a starting pitcher. I think you do too, Brad. But yeah, I mean, we'll we'll see. I guess we'll find out for sure. If I don't think anyone would be surprised if the Braves had a starting pitcher, and I mean, I really hope they do.

00:04:08
Speaker 1: You and I we could go in the same time slot Sunday the evening and talked about started pitching extensively, and part of the reason for that was because of things that Alex had said previously. And like, I think that you made the point that has to be stressed that you don't take everything as gospel that a GM or POBO or whatever title the person has says on the record. There's inklings. You can take things from from what is said, you can rule things out potentially, you can rule things in potentially. That all matters. But his first plub of comments pointed to, hey, we want to address roundy pitching, like he kind of did say that on the record a couple of weeks ago, a week and a half ago. I think treating Grant Holmes this is actually the courtesy of daveil Briant, who had these notes from the beating on Sunday afternoon with with Alex. But treating Grant Holmes like he's back is a good thing. That's another arm the Braves can have. It also does not mean that he has ruled into the rotation automatically as well, Like Granholmes has a long record of being a relief pitcher, for example, and a guy who did not have a cl UCL surgery on his pitching arm. It could be fine, but it also may not be and he might just be a reliever. We'll see. So he that that versatility for me is a is a plus. The fact that you can have him as a starting pitching option but also have him in the bullpen very reasonably asure long man. That's cool. That does not mean you don't want a start a pitcher by any means. No, I know you didn't say that near did He just keep that in mind for everybody else. He did kind of stress again that Johan Meenez is not to the same part of the development curve return curve that Grenolmes is. That's not new. He did say that earlier in the off season. I know he mentioned on the radio and then re kind of reaffirmed that. Then that's in a second second cleanup procedure on the knee to cost him last season. But they're not counting on him essentially until he ramps up, and that's the right move. Like they're paying him. He's owed money. He's been good for a long time. But you until you see I got pitch should be healthy, you can't assume he's going to be so I think having it's almost like to the side of the depth chart is probably how you have to approach that. Does that make sense at all? Like it's just like, I hope we have him. He's good when he's pitching, but we just don't know.

00:06:21
Speaker 2: If it was like an organizational flow chart, I think it would be like a dotted line to Joejamenez at this point. And you know, I wonder as the Braves make their moves in the coming weeks, they might put bullpen to the back burner until they've had a chance to see Joejmenez throw a handful of bullpens and see and if that knee is still causing problems, then, dear Lord, I mean, then it becomes like even more critical they go out and add a high impact reliever or two or three. But if they feel like that Jimenez is going to be healthy and the doctors have given him a clean bill of health and he's throwing the ball well and isn't reporting any discomfort, obviously, then you feel much better about your seventh and eighth innings is currently constructed. I still think they need to go out and add probably one reliever of note probably I mean it's not going to be an Edwin Diaz or I mean, I really like Pete Fairbanks, but I don't think Pete Fairbanks is going to come here to take an eighth inning role when teams are looking for closers. But there's still a lot of really fine middle relievers, both in the free agent market and in trade. We saw over the weekend a big trade with the Mariners and the Nationals trading for a left handed reliever, and it was a hefty return that Seattle paid for it. So it's really good. Relievers are never cheap. And I think, especially if there's any kind of question about Jimenez, the Braves are going to have to do something with the bullbend. There's just not enough proven commodities out there. Even if you want to say, well, maybe we put Grant Holmes or Ronaldo Lopez out there.

00:07:47
Speaker 1: Yeah, I don't truly know that as well. And you know, you can wait a little bit on relievers. Maybe not the top guys, but if you go beyond the Robert Suarez Edwin Diaz to tier of guys, somebody's gonna wait. I mean, everything's going to happen early. We see that every year. Now that the market seems to move slower than we all wanted to on an annual basis, no matter what. So yeah, I agree with all of that. The other thing is, there were two more things that made some waves I've seen online that Alex said today. One of them is that he expressed a preference, not a guarantee, but a preference that the Braves were to operate without a full time assigned DH, basically splitting the duties at the position, which is something that I know I've said, I think you have as well. Is my preference as well, like I don't. It doesn't mean that you can't have a full time BHY. If Kyle Schwover wanted to sign for a very reasonable price, come on down, Kyle. That's that's totally fine. But I think in a perfect world I would prefer another outfielder to a full time BH. You want to have another bat of some Kyle. That's kind of mistaition. It's also worth making what he said what he's saying here, and he didn't lay this out in detail, but I wonder what you think about this. He didn't say we don't want another bat. He said we don't want to in an ideal world have a full time DH. That's an interesting and important distinction to make. Like, I think they need a bat and I've said that a number of times on this podcast, But that doesn't mean it has to be more sol Zuna, Kyle Schwarber DH only player. It can be an outfielder preferably for me anyway, Does that make sense? And also, I mean that's that was my read between the lines. I'd be surprised if Alex didn't want to add to the offense. I saw people reading that in reading that into basically like thinking, hey, it's going to be Baldwin Murphy and a rotation Like maybe it will be, but that's not what That's not what I said.

00:09:40
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think, I mean we've we've talked about it numerous times on the show, but adding an outfielder to not only play in the outfield but also rotate at DH with with Akunya in profar would be terrific. Or even if they don't want to add a traditional outfielder but want to add like Ryan O'Hearn is a player who I've been digging into quite a bit, could play first base, although rarely, of course does Matt Alson need to breathe, and you know O'Hearn could play a corner outfield on occasion. I mean, truthfully, he's probably about as good out there as Jordson profar Is.

00:10:11
Speaker 1: I was gonna say, It's not like a huge downgrade from Profarance or whatever else. Last year was not the best other than the arm so.

00:10:18
Speaker 2: For sure, and you could always sub him out in the corners. Are similar bets out there too to Ryan O'Hearn, where as long as they are not just a total I mean, unless they're Marcello Zuna. Most players can stand in a corner spot and not just completely kill you if they have done it in the past. But I'm all for it. I think it's a great way. I'm all for rotating DH as long as you add a hitter of some kind to this lineup. Keep guys off their feet, let him rest. You can rest Accoona that way, but not lose his bat. Just give them some time off his feet. There's a lot of reasons, like you said, short of Kyle Schwarber, like knocking on Alex's door at the winter meeting and saying, Hey, Bud, I want to sign with Atlanta. Where do I go? Yeah? All for it.

00:10:58
Speaker 1: There are three guys in the light up that I think it would benefit to have the ability to DH at least sometimes. You already mentioned one of them. Ronald Profar is another, and then Baldwin. I don't think Baldwin has to DH every single day. Is not playing Catcher. I'm not of the mind of that, but I do think that he can and should DH some like. I don't think that his bad is like an elite one at DH, but it's good enough to play there on a regular basis. Note I did not say Sean Murphy, even though I'm a Sean Murphy guy. I prefer to have Murphy not DH all that often, which means you're signing somebody else. Because right now he's DH. He's the best option you have on the current roster. So one way to go. But that was an interesting comment that made a lot of noise. The other one was that Alex said that the Braves would at least consider giving up the kind of bonus first round pick that they got and the Drake Balwin winning the Rookie of the Year tracker we chok there for three months. He wanted they get an extra pick, but I had to laugh. Scott. People were acting like this is this is like huge news.

00:11:59
Speaker 2: It was.

00:12:00
Speaker 1: It was not huge news to me because he would never say anything else. There's no reason for Alex to say, you know what, note we refuse to give up that pick for anyone. We're we will we will never, we will never because there are guys some qualifying offers that if they want to take a discount to go to Atlanta, yeah, he's not gonna not take them. So that was my reaction. Maybe I'm a cynic. In fact, I know, I know I'm a cynic Scott, but I kind of had the eye roll with some of the reactions like, oh, this is not really I mean, he kind of said what you have to say, right, Mike Crazy.

00:12:29
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's it's all part of the calculus. And if you can get a deal that you just absolutely love for Michael King or Ranger Suarez or Zach Gallon or one of these qualifying off offer hitters, then sure, like that's all part of the decision that you have to make. If you give up that pick, then you don't presumably you don't have to give up prospects in the trade, like you can't have it. I've seen more and more of this. And I know it's social media, and I got to be careful who I give a platform too. But people want to add good players, but they don't want to lose the qualifying off for draft pick. But then they don't want to lose that pick, but then they don't want to give up any good prospects to trade for someone like Byron Bucks. Then it's like, guys, you have to give somewhere in order to add talent to your team. Short of the once a decade just Grand Slam of all Grand Slam trades like Chris Sale for Von Grissom, those deals just don't happen that much. You got to give up something, whether it's a pick or prospects, and you know, it's I think it's just kind of that, where do we want to sacrifice in order to add talent to our team.

00:13:32
Speaker 1: I know the sentiment is really negative on Alex now compared to where it used to be, and I get it because they just had a bad season. So that makes makes total sense on that front. But everything he's saying, you have to remember he has to negotiate with players and agents, so like even so that's one example of hey, we're we're gonna close the door on giving that pick away for a player cool even the grand homes thing. Like Alex is not incentivized to tell the whole world that, man, we really really, really really need to sign a starting pitcher. Like that puts you in a bad spot in negotiations. Does that matter that much? Maybe not. But like he wants to keep all his options open, and that frustrates everybody. I know. People wanted to be a little bit more forceful or whatever. That's not gonna be him. He's a He likes to keep his options open. That's just the way that Alex operates. And I will just to wrap up this first segment, I have to quote, I have to give you the credit on this because you said it most recently. There is a belief, for some reason on the Internet that Alex is the one who decides how much money to spend. And that drives me absolutely nuts. And you might copy you commented on it this week. I know Steven has as well. I think Sean maybe has even two. But it's so funny to me, Alex does not set payroll guys. Alex makes a lot of money in the real world, a lot more money than I do, and a lot more money than you do. He isn't the one paying the players. He's choosing how to spend the money he's given. To be fair, there's a responsibility with that. But it's so funny that I think the one you quote it was bargain beIN Alex or whatever it was that was making me laugh. It's like, guys, he has a payroll like everybody else. You have a budget in your life you have to spend. I know my budget's not that big. I don't want that much money. It's gotten my role, so I can't go out and just buy a Porsche like maybe I could if I did nothing else of my life. I could probably handle that for like two sets for like two months. But I have a budget to have to stick to.

00:15:15
Speaker 2: Yeah. Yes, sadly, Alex does not have two hundred million dollars just sitting on his desk to go out and spend. And yeah, if you if you want to be angry, be angry at Braves holding llcr K.

00:15:28
Speaker 1: Yeah, if you want to yell about money, yell at Terry McGirk. That's he's the face of that. It's not just him, but he is. He's the more of the face of the money sun.

00:15:36
Speaker 2: There is not a sitting general manager or player of baseball operations in Major League Baseball who is voluntarily not spending money.

00:15:44
Speaker 1: Yes, that is correct. It is easier to do your job no matter who you are, if you have the Dodgers funding. Like I think Andrew Freeman is very, very smart and good at his job. I think he would tell you it's a lot easier to do your job when you have unlimited funds.

00:16:00
Speaker 2: It just is.

00:16:01
Speaker 1: So yeah, oh yeah, anyway, all right, there's some other new stuff to get to some outside guys to talk about. Hassan Kim's back in the news a little bit, The Twins popular trade partner with the Braves in the news a little bit. Zach gallon transactions. We got we got more to talk about in a second after a word from a partners. Okay, Scott, old friend, Jeff Passen, your guy along with Buster only at ESPN did their kind of Winter Meetings preview manifesto essentially, and the one thing about the Braves in that piece was that they wrote that Hassan Kim quote could return to Atlanta on a shorter term deal or seek longer term security elsewhere.

00:16:42
Speaker 2: End quote.

00:16:43
Speaker 1: Is that a huge quote now? But every it is notable to me that all the national guys passing busterer Ken Rosenthal or colleague of Foulid Territory Robert everyone's leaving the door open for the Braves in Hassan Kim, no one is closing the door on that. That was my big takeaway. What did you make of this? And also like the realities of this topic because Hassong is rerapped by Scott Boris, who is usually not in a hurry, and that's gonna frustrate everybody. I think.

00:17:10
Speaker 2: Yeah, my take on Hasson Kim has been pretty much the same for a month at this point. If it is a reasonable contract and a shorter contract, then sign me up. I truly feel as long as the Braves have a decent amount of money to still work with that having Hasng Kim as your shortstop makes the Atlanta Braves a better baseball team in twenty twenty six and probably twenty twenty seven. It also frees up then Mauricio Dubon to be your super utility guy. He can play basically everywhere on the field other than pitch and catch. That being said, if things get hairy with Hassan Kim, and it's a you know, three year deal, four year deal, which was kind of been talked about a little bit. I'm capital letters out out. I just don't think he's that good of a player, especially with some of the concerning trends that he had last year after having shoulder surgery. And sure, hey, if the Braves get hass On Kim, I think it'll be a good addition. But I also think this team needs a hitter as well as Hassan Kim. And if we talked about this a couple of weeks ago, I would much rather spend money on a big bat and keep Mauricio Dumont at shortstop, then add has On Kim and not have the funds to add a bopper to the middle of this lineup.

00:18:19
Speaker 1: Go back to what we talked about a second ago with the payroll, I think we all agree the best, the best path forward, it's not our money, would be to do hass On Kim and a bat. Well, we're not saying Othertheless, we're trying to live in reality, not fantasy land. But ideally you spend the money, he just fix it all, you know what I mean, Like whether it's trade or whatever. But I do think that in that scenario we talked about even on the show two weeks ago, Dubon and a big bat is a I prefer, especially if the Kim market gets out of control. What that number is, we don't know. Robert brought it up. I just teased it a second ago. But Scott Morris is known for being slow in the last especially the last several years. He's kind of pivoted to being the world going to wait it out agent, and Alex is, as before, I would say, multiple times been unwilling to wait for a single player, which I think is probably the right move. Like if you want to keep your options open and some great opportunity comes to you that you have to either do now or wait, he tends to just take the opportunity, which I think is logical, and the big picture, it could not be it could be the wrong move. But if Huston Kim isn't going to sign until March, which we don't know that that's gonna happen, but if he wants to wait forever and ever, Alex may not be willing to wait, which is part of the nuance here as well. And also huston. Kim is a good player. He is not without risk at all. I think that's kind of been framing in some ways, like he's not he's never been a great hitter. He's been a good hitter before, not a great one. And then defensively, the numbers were really good before last year. We worked that good. So like he's not some world beater. I think he's better than more issue of bomb. I'm pretty confident about that. But he's not pick your awesome star level of shortstop. So we'll see yeah. Elsewhere. On the market side of things, Ken rosehal our guy from All Territory and The Athletic, wrote that the Twins a popular trade faked not with a fake trade partner for the Braves recently. The quote was that Ken does not anticipate the Twins moving centerfielder Byron Buxton or right handers Joe Ryan Pablo Up as a quarry. Two league sources briefed on their plans. I'm gonna go to you first because you had a reaction to this that I think I also shared. But what did you think when you read that report from Ken?

00:20:31
Speaker 2: So it could be entirely accurate. Maybe the Twins had a come to Jesus meeting and said, you know what, we've been bad. Instead of trading and starting a rebuild that we probably need to do, we're going to try for one more year and we're going to try to add and figure this thing out. I mean, hell, a year ago, there was an argument for the Toronto Blue Jays to sell off some of their parts and the game within five pitches of winning the World Series. I don't think the Twins are to that level. And my big reaction to Rosenthal's report that the Twins are going to hang on to their players is, one, what else are the Twins going to say from a negotiation standpoint? And two if you just kind of add one and one together, we talk about this Twins roster is not very good. The team is in major financial debt. Lopez and Ryan only have two years of control left, so every day that ticks off a calendar, their value presumably goes down a bit. And Byron Buxton, his trade value is never been higher. He's coming off his healthiest season in nearly a decade. Was awesome. All Star was a I think a silver slugger like trading Byron Buxton now is the epitome of selling high on a really talented player. So sure, maybe again, maybe the Twins are going to hang on here, But myriad is this is kind of posturing and trying to get asking prices up, because guess what if the Twins had an awesome offer for Byron Buxton already, he'd probably be traded.

00:21:56
Speaker 1: Yeah, we totally agree, and this goes back a little bit to what we said about Alex. Always try to consider the other side, like what is the team trying to cops with what they're saying. And Ken's really good. He's not gonna just print something to print it like he has good information, So they're trying to get that out there. They're telling them things. But also they don't have any incentive to say we're selling everybody, especially in that remember before it came out like three days ago in like early December, Like they're not gonna wave the white flag and say, all right, guys, everything must go Barkin, basic prices whatever.

00:22:27
Speaker 2: That never happens in baseball, Like even the Cardinals kind of did it a little bit, but even then they were like, well, we're not just giving these guys away, right, Never do you see I remember even a decade ago when the Braves did their famous fire sale of Hayward and Upton and Kimberl and like that was out of the blue, right like the morning they traded Jason Hayward. They weren't forecasting that. Why would you?

00:22:49
Speaker 1: There were no leaks about that. Yeah, so both the can be true. The twins may not trade these guys, and I think that is very possible, maybe even likely. But this is not slam the door on that either. Like they they should get this point, even if they're even if they were planning on trading Byron Buston, Joe Ryan Babolpez, any competation of the three, they should come out and say what they said.

00:23:11
Speaker 2: Okay, of course. So yeah, by the way, you're in a truck. Yeah, if you're selling a truck for for ten thousand, when you meet the guy who's interested in your truck, you don't walk up and go, Brad, I'll say this truck right now for sixty five hundred dollars. Please say yeah, of course not. You go, well, I'm pretty firm at ten thousand. Maybe I'll go to like ninety five. Maybe in your mind you'll sell it for eight, but you don't that's that is the worst possible negotiation.

00:23:34
Speaker 1: I agree, if you want more. By the way, Sean Steven had a very lengthy chat about Brian Buckston on this podcast last week, so listen to that.

00:23:42
Speaker 2: A lot of nuance in that one.

00:23:44
Speaker 1: Good a good chat. I agree with most of what I heard from the two of them. Interesting topic, for sure, it's not it's not clearcut Byron Buston has injury issues all that stuff. But you're right. He I just checked. He finished eleventh in MVP voting in the American League this year. He was really, really good and when he's healthy is awesome. And we'll see if they if they if they trade him. The Braves are a very logical team to get in the mix. We don't know if they're gonna do that or not. He's from not Atlanta, but he's from Georgia, et cetera. Last thing on the intel reporting front mark fiensintl dot com lump the Braves in as a team that is quote also looking at Zach Gallen, Arizo Diamondback's right hander. There was also an interesting news cycle was Zach Gallen the other day where Bob Night and Gil reported and then didn't report on Gallon going to the Cubs. It was interesting. Jeff Passett came in on the top of that. Look it up if you want to. But also foul territory, as Jim Bowden wrote a piece of The Athletic with twelve for agent signings that he'd like to see happen again. He'd like to see. So it wasn't reporting this, but he actually gave Gallon to the Braves at five years and one thirty five and people were not very happy with that when they saw that. So I throw a lot of a lot of you there, Scott, But Zach Gallan and it's back in the news. We discussed him a week ago. Anything you like to add to any of that.

00:25:05
Speaker 2: You know, we talked about Zach Gallen quite a bit. I'll summarize it, but he is not my preferred option on the free agent market. Assuming he's getting similar money to Rangers Warrez and Michael King, I think I'd prefer those other two to Gallen. He is. There are some reasons to think Gallen might be able to bounce back, but if it's anywhere near five years and one hundred and thirty five million dollars, I mean that would be that's pretty rich, too rich for my blood, But I sure, I mean, it's always interesting when you see the Braves connected with a top ten, top twelve free agent this offseason.

00:25:39
Speaker 1: As a reminder, if you missed our show last week or just haven't remember this, these numbers, Gallen is projected by the three major projection systems Eleitrey, Rumors, Fangrafts, ESPN for between eighteen and twenty million dollars a year for between two and four years. The biggest deal he was producted for was four for eighty one. Five is a considerably larger investment than even the top of the projections. And again, there's sometimes wrong occasionally guys, well, could we'll just get a lot more than the projections. We don't know these guys are. They're not soothsayers, but we were. You and I were wavering at four eighty five. One thirty five would be and would be a no go for me, even though it's not my money and I I'm trying to put myself in the true serum mode of Okay, the Braves. Tomorrow it's announced that they give him five for one thirty five. What is my reaction? I think my reaction would be all right. The Braves are better than they were yesterday, and that deal was more than I would have wanted to spend.

00:26:34
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it'd be fair to say that's a bad contract.

00:26:38
Speaker 1: I yeah, I don't think I would not have given that contract. So we'll see. If I had to guess, that's a deal that Alex won't give to Zach goin. If they're ever gonna do that, you could probably get Ragers Farez for that. And I think Ragers Swarez is better than that goin, So we'll see. Anyway, that's the latest thing we're looking for. Intel, We're looking for sports rumors. As Robert Murray just guess, no one believes us for some reason. Robert Murray, a National Baseball writer and reporter, was basically like, the Braves never leak anything, and they don't. They're really hard to report on. It makes our lives a little bit more difficult than other teams that have a constant flow of rumors to discuss. But that's what we have so far. Zach Gallen stuff, Hassan Kim stuff, twins buzz. We'll leave it there for now. Scott is more to talk about in a second, including a brief Hall of Fame, and I do be brief because we don't talk about a Hall of Fame a lot that much on this podcast. That's coming up in a second, plus a transaction wave, lots of transactions. Are they big names? No, but we'll talk about them and more after work for Repartners, Okay, Scott. Unfortunately, Dale Murphy did not make the Hall of Fame that broke as we were starting to this podcast. If you were not following this story closely, the Contemporary Era Committee met and voted only on Jeff Kent, making it so Murphy did not near to Don Mattingly or others. We don't cover the Hall of Fame breathlessly on the show on purpose. It's not really any of our things. But I'd like to see Murphy get in.

00:28:09
Speaker 2: It'd be fun.

00:28:10
Speaker 1: He's a legendary, brave, a guy that everybody looks. That's kind of all I have. Like, it's unfortunate. I actually should I should know this. Do you know if he's if he's eligible again. I think he's still eligible. It's like it's overframe, right.

00:28:22
Speaker 2: I think he's still eligible. And then fran of the show, Grant McCauley reported, tonight that Murphy only received six of the twelve votes, So that's not great for Murph. I know there are a ton of Braves fans who rightfully hope that Dale Murphy gets in one day. Hall of Fame requirements have dropped significantly over the last few years as the eras have changed and just kind of the the way that baseball has played has changed. But yeah, not great for Murph tonight, But yeah, I think he's The contemporary vote is different than like the traditional vote and all that, But I think Murph still has a chance. In twenty twenty six, he.

00:29:02
Speaker 1: Had unquestionably a Hall of Fame peak. It's that the longevity and the accounting stats are not quite where they always and that's an argument we're not gonna have tonight. There's the always the peak versus longevity argument with Hall of Fame. This is a two time MVP, like Delburvihy was a great, great, great player, and unfortunately he's fallen shorts, but more hopefully more opportunities for deal in the future. And we'll leave that to our willing and able colleagues to discuss that further, including by the way, grants of great work on this for a long time. He's He's interviewed market multiple times. Read Grant always Grant sauce the aforementioned transaction wave from the other day. For the Braves, we know this is these are not big name This is why this is the thirty minute mark of this podcast and not earlier. But the Raves did. They claimed two guys off waivers and then reportedly agreed to a minor league deal with a guy that I knew. So that's that's something. Probably the biggest one is that they claimed Oswaldo Bido off waivers from the A's. He's thirty years old, right hander. He was pretty bad last year, say that out loud, but he actually was legitimately good at twenty twenty four and like not fake good, like under the hood good stack cast good stuff plus good, like he was actually good a year and a half ago. That's the That's the something. That point for me is like, Alex, if they can get him back to where he was a year and a half ago, you got something. That's my only reaction to that.

00:30:26
Speaker 2: There seems to be a common trend with these very back end of the forty man roster relievers that Alex and thopless in the front office will target is that maybe they're coming off bad years and that's why they're available. But as recently as a year or two or three ago, they were good and that's I mean, that was kind of like with Yoel Piomps. That was probably why they invested in him, even at a higher level than us of all though Bido. Look, man, if they boot Beto off the forty men roster in the next couple of months, nobody will be shocked. If he shows up to spring training and is one of the on March tenth, nobody will be shocked. But sure, I mean, there's no harm in shuffling the back of your forty man roster for players you think might be a little bit better than what you currently have. And if not, no harm, no foul. I mean, the reaction to these is crazy to me. Every team does this. Every team cycles the back end of their rosters. You're looking for your Tyler Matzik, you're looking for your Grant Holmes, right like, players who probably weren't going to make the team, but then you find something and they end up being really valuable pieces.

00:31:29
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's what leads to the bargain beIN Alex quote that you referenced earlier. This is normal activity, guys. If this is all they do, then sure get mad about it. We poked plenty of fun at Brian Day La Cruz last winter. It's the whole show about it because it was that slow at that point in time. But beto again, I'll look at sackas page right now for twenty twenty four. There's a lot of bright red on this page, like he was legitimately good a year and a half ago. So that's the one that if I'm ranking these importance, That's why we do this one first. That one might matter. It might not, though to your point in a month, if he's on a team anymore, that will not be a surprise. It's just that if you find something, you find something. If you don't, you don't. We'll see. They also claimed Anthony Molina, a twenty three year old right handed off waivers from the Rockies, might one and only take right now on the podcast is that the Braves like to mine the Rockies. Because I think Alex wouldn't say this. He's not saying this. I'm saying it. I think there's probably believe that the front office the Rockies are not well run, and they might be able to find someone that the Rockies can't fix and fix them.

00:32:35
Speaker 2: Yeah, just my guess, why not take a chance hears Johnson Tyler Kinley two examples. Yeah, the Rockies are terribly run, they don't develop anybody. Sure, take a chance. And if if the same thing I just said for Ozavaldo Bido, Yeah, if.

00:32:50
Speaker 1: You without with not the Knight's numbers. Like to be fair, he's a lot younger. Molina has never been good in the majors, but he's twenty three and he's a former Rule five guy, like he has some pedigree. He's never been good in the way that Beato had, which is why he's next on the list. But same principle applies for sure, I would say the last one. On the addition side, they reportedly agree to a minor league deal with Ben Gamble. If you're a baseball guy, you probably have heard him at some point. He's thirty three years old now kind of a depth outfielder. Lefty was like a good third fourth outfielder for several seasons. Now he's probably the organizational depth. If I had to guess, like he'll be in Gwinnett maybe you get an injury or something like that, and he's on your team for two weeks. I think Eli White is better than Ben Gamble in twenty twenty five, so oh yeah, he's That's kind of like Eli White's probably your fourth guy right now on the outfield. Ben Gamble is your fifth guy, which means he's probably in Gwinnette. But another guy that people he's a maaguor league quality player. That's what I would say, not a great one, but a major leaguer.

00:33:53
Speaker 2: Every spring, the Braves are going to bring ten, fifteen to twenty of these kind of veterans without really a place to play, and you give him a tryout and ninety nine percent of the time it leads to nothing. And I'm sure Gamble will get a couple of a bats on the you know, February twenty eighth spring training game in the afternoon, and who knows, every now and then there's a great story and he'll he'll put together a really good spring. But I'm guessing if you go to Gwinnett Stripper's games, you might see some Ben Gamble this upcoming year, or he'll just get cut, like most of these types of signings get cut in the spring and.

00:34:25
Speaker 1: The last one is the Braves dfaid Josh Walker. So in the last month, November sixth, Walker was dfaid by the Orioles. Then on November thirteenth, the Braves planing them off waivers. Then three weeks later they did a Josh Walker. So that was the cycle. Normal again, normal activity, take of whatever the flat. We don't know why they claimed him in the first place. We don't know. We don't know why they're doing this now other than forty man space. But they just prioritize somebody else over Josh Walker. Sad enough to satisfy that great okay, moving right along. Last thing on the show, barring another Dale Murphy Hall of Fame news nugget the drafts water recording is that the draft Lottery is on Tuesday, and this might be our last show before Tuesday. We don't know. If something happens tomorrow, we'll do it. We'll do a show. But in the meantime, five point thirty pm Eastern is the Draft Lottery. What an odd time to do that. Typical baseball do a reasonably big event at a weird time. Yet Scott zips himself. If you're not watching this on YouTube, But the big thing is, as long as we've been doing the show, we've not covered a lot of lotteries because in fact, the format changed and the Braves been good basically ever since. So the Braves have a four point five to four percent chance to pick number one in the draft, that is number six on the odds. And also it's not just about picking number one. You want to pick as high as possible to get a the pick, but also the extra bonus pool money when you talk to Carlos Colazo or old friend on the show. That was a good primer for this as well. But we'll react to it when it's over. But the big thing is, hey, Tuesday evening is when we find out where the Breds are picking, and we obviously hope it's number one. That'd be awesome. But two's better than three, three is better than four, et cetera. Anything you want to add about the draft lottery.

00:36:18
Speaker 2: A couple thoughts. I mean, number one, it is a bummer. And it's funny to say this, but it is a bummer. The Braves won so many games in September because I think they were like two games away from having the third or fourth best odds, which is, which is a shame. At one point they think they were number two. I don't know if they never were number one. I don't think they ever jumped the pirates. But as a reminder, they won. It was ten straight right, they won ten straight games. It's a tough course, ten straight games. I think we did a pot Yeah, I think we did a podcast quite literally titled the Braves are winning, of course, But yes, draft lottery a foreign concept to Braves fans. But as Brad said, four and a half percent chance the number one pick, which is sixth best odds Baseball does a weird lottery. It would probably make no sense for me to explain the ins and outs of how it's done, but basically, the lottery picks the top six teams. The Braves have close to a fifty percent chance of being in the top six, and then I think they run the numbers again. It is a very overly complex system for how it works, but obviously you want as high of a pick as you can and man alive. Brad if there was ever a draft lottery for the Braves to strike gold and move up to the number one pick. MLB Pipeline talked about their top one hundred draft prospects and the number one projected pick is Rock Chilawski, a shortstop from UCLA. And in that MLB Pipeline scouting report on Schilawski, they said, quote he is considered by some to be the best all around college shortstop prospect since Troy Tulowitzki in the two thousand and five draft. Crush your fingers. That would be a look, man, the draft. It's unpredictable. These there are no sure things other than like your Paul Stein's or your Bryce Harper's. There are so few guarantees in the draft. But if there was every year for the Braves to move up to number one getting a maybe I think the word generational gets thrown around too much, but maybe a generational type of shortstop prospect to take number one when this team has had an enormous black hole there since Dansby Swanson left would be huge. I mean, you don't want to undert that this is not taking an eighteen year old high school pitcher. I mean this is someone who you draft in July and maybe you could see him in Atlanta a year later.

00:38:37
Speaker 1: Yeah, And of course we'll talk about a lot of the options when we know what the lottery says, again, it's a four and a half percent chance. Yeah, that isn't a very high chance. The math will tell you they're not picking number one very often, but hey, maybe they will be. But the good thing is they're going to have a lot more bonus money to spend this draft and they usually have to poke up with the frot system a little bit. Carlos express, but I think nationally is not. No one is super impressed by the brat frontis. There's there's variations of that. It's not a disaster of a system, but it's not an elite one. I think we can all agree on that. So beefing it up a little bit would be helpful. And this is one step, one step towards doing that. So we will see. And uh, you know, the gap between number one number six is what three and a half million in bus money. It's what you said, that's a lot of money. Man Like, it would be helpful if they were higher than lower, and we will react to that when it comes. And just to say it's out loud, it is. We're not going to suddenly cover the draft every show for seven months like the Baseball The Baseball draft is not that kind of thing. Like I cover basketball, as people probably know, it's a giant topic throughout the season in the NBA when it's a good draft, people talk about the number one pick in the draft if it's a famous player every day, like Victor woman Yama, who's a famous was a story for a year and a half before he was drafted. Baseball is not quite like that, even when it was Harper schemes. It's a big deal if you're a sicko. It's not an everyday topic in the way, and especially in baseball because of what you just said. No matter even if the if the Braves won the lottery and they drafted roch Alowski, it still would not be He's coming up the day he's drafted, and it's gonna start shortstop like it's gonna take a while, and it's baseball, so but it still matters. So both things are play in play here. We have pretty much ignored the draft on this show other than right around the draft every year. We won't If they win it, it'll be a bigger topic both this week and then again later on in the spring, et cetera. If they have their more pick.

00:40:34
Speaker 2: In the draft.

00:40:35
Speaker 1: But that's the one small upside of being bad is that you draft hire.

00:40:41
Speaker 2: So it's nice and hopefully this is a rare occurrence for the Braves. Let's get a top pick, even if it's not one move up to the top three, the top five. Every time you move up it's worth anywhere from five hundred thousand to seven hundred and fifty thousand in slot pull money, which is a big deal. I mean, that can be the difference between swaying a high level will college commit to going pro instead of going to college. So yeah, crosh your fingers again five point thirty on Tuesday evening, and we will whenever we do a show after that, we will certainly talk about it then. And you know, let's help crush your fingers and let's get a top pick. Would be a huge boost to this franchise and organization to make the most out of just a miserable twenty twenty five season.

00:41:22
Speaker 1: I should have asked Carlos I he was going to be doing any TV, because you know, he's always on the draft the actual night of the draft. I'm not sure about the lottery, but listen to the show that you did with Carlos Closet that was a good listen a week plus ago at this point during the takestgiving week. It also applies right now. Nothing has changed on that front, so Evergreen at least for now episode Scott, we have done it. We have kept things under an hour this time. Our show last week was seventy minutes long. That was probably a little bit too longing for us. So we're getting out right now at forty two minutes. Anything to plug at the end of the show if not, wor can folks find you on social media? They're looking for you.

00:41:54
Speaker 2: I am at Scott Coleman fifty five on Twitter slash x. And as we said, we'll have plenty of content from the Winter meetings, any kind of transaction, even like hot rumors, which I know are few and far between for the Braves. But if we get real news or rumors or anything that's worth talking about, I promise you we will have plenty of coverage this week and then all throughout the off season. We of course do not go away, and as always, a big thank you for the support and for everybody for tuning in.

00:42:19
Speaker 1: Absolutely please subscribe to hemor Territory anywhere you get your podcast. We're part of a foul territory network, Apple, Spotify, YouTube. We're trying to get to five thousand subscriber on YouTube, so get us there by subscribe. If you're an audio listener, I would say this, but I'm an audio podcast guy. I am still subscribed on YouTube to many shows that I support because it helps them to grow their podcast. So go ahead and do that now as well. But ratings reviews, and importantly tell your friends. We know you have brace band friends in your life, share the podcast with them on social or on a text or an email or whatever you have to do. If you're old like us, maybe even word of mouth. Say it to someone, Hey, follow this awesome podcast. It's Hammor Territory to cod of Braves all year round. Scott's laughing at because I'm old. That'll do it for us. Everybody you being here as always, subscribe. We'll see you all next time.